The Canadians

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11A primeval northland as big as Europe The vast Canadian wilderness, which stretched from the Great Lakes to the Pacific Ocean, yielded with great reluctance to the French and British adventurers who went west in search of furs, then gold and finally farmland. The immense territory, greater in area than all Western Europe, embraced every extreme of terram and climate, from prairies where summer temperatures could reach 1 1 0° F., to a bleak north country locked in íce. Somé of the tallest, most forbidding peaks of the Rocky Mountains and coastal rangé barred the route to the Pacific Ocean, and ímmense tracts of what appeared to be flatland were merely floating layers of quaking muskeg. The westbound pioneers traveled in a fascinating variety of ways. During winter, men slogged along on snowshoes, carrying their goods on their backs or on dog sleds. In summer, many frontiersmen used pack horses or highwheeled, single-axle Red River carts (below), which were light enough to traverse the muddy plains and tundra. But the most common means of travel was the canoe. Paddling through Canada's far-flung network of rivers and lakes, with mtermittent portages, üoyageurs made epic journeys covenng thousands of miles, taking in supplies, bringing out furs - and planting the first crude settlements. Canada's two coasts were not linked by transcontinental railroad until 1 885, and it may be several centuries before the great wi ld land can be truly declared tamed. Vissza